Four years after Ft. Hood, Pentagon still studying base security

Jared Serbu reports.

Aaron Alexis, a recently-hired information technology contractor who gunned down
12 people at the Washington Navy Yard on Monday, had not had a formal relationship
with the Navy for several years.

But his security clearance, which he gained during the period when he served in
the Navy Reserve between 2007 and 2011, gained him nearly automatic access to a
Common Access Card (CAC) without any new background investigation when he went to
work for a private contractor. His preexisting clearance, which requires a new
investigation only once every decade, sufficed.

Alexis was one of an estimated 3.6 million people in and outside of government
with a current secret-level security clearance, and Defense officials acknowledged
Wednesday that even if someone had concerns about his aberrant behavior, which
reportedly included multiple run-ins with local law enforcement during and after
his uniformed Navy service, there is no single channel to report problems to the
various officials who investigate, authorize and revoke security clearances.

The Navy Yard incident bore a tragic resemblance to the 2009 rampage at Fort Hood,
Texas. Then, 13 people died when an insider with access to the base fired fatal
shots at colleagues.

Still, Defense officials say lessons learned from four years ago may have
prevented an even worse toll at the Navy Yard.

"In terms of what we changed after some of those earlier incidents, early
indications are that they actually contributed to a less-horrific outcome," said
Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "Alert notices,
coordination in advance with other agencies, training for employees and law
enforcement on active shooter scenarios. Some of those things we did before
actually reaped the benefits we intended. The security clearance piece of this is
something we have to take another look at, and the Secretary of Defense has
directed us to do so."

Procedures in place

Officials also point to the implementation of a reverse-911 system on bases to
alert employees and residents of an emergency and give instructions on what to do.
Additionally, they highlighted a formalized agreement with the FBI that obligates
DoD and federal civilian law enforcement agencies to share information about known
threats to military bases and personnel, and likewise, potential threats to others
from current and former military personnel.

But what's been done to date is not good enough, said Defense Secretary Chuck
Hagel. On Tuesday, he ordered new reviews of security procedures, both of which
will be led by Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter. The reviews will encompass
the physical security and access procedures by which people get on to military
bases and the department's current processes for issuing security clearances.

"This review will be closely coordinated with other federal agencies currently
examining these procedures, including the [Director of National Intelligence] and
the [Office of Management and Budget]," Hagel told reporters. "I've also directed
that an independent panel be established. This panel will conduct its own
assessment of security at DoD facilities and our security clearance procedures and
practices. This panel will strengthen Secretary Carter's efforts, and they will
provide their findings directly to me."

The independent panel model mirrors the department's response to the Fort Hood
shooting. That study, plus a follow-on review and a separate examination by the Defense Science Board collectively
produced 89 recommendations. Then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates told the
department to implement them in a 2010 memo. So far, 52 of them have been
implemented in their entirety, a senior Defense official said.

Continuous monitoring in the works

Those that have not yet come fully into department policy relate mostly to the
science board's recommendation that DoD implement specialized, multi-disciplinary
threat management units to identify patterns of behavior that might lead to
violence.

A second official, who was speaking on background, said the Pentagon also is
creating a system that would continuously monitor and evaluate security-cleared
personnel based on records from non-Defense agencies. It would automatically push
information about police encounters with clearance holders on an ongoing basis
rather than waiting for a periodic background check. The official, who spoke to
reporters on the condition of anonymity, said DoD still was developing the system,
and did not say when it would come online.

Adm. Jonathan Greenert, the Chief of Naval Operations, said the Navy is conducting
its own rapid review of base security procedures around the world and expects to
have initial results within two weeks.

He testified to the House Armed Services Committee one day after the release of a
DoD Inspector General report
which found the Navy had implemented a base access control system for contractors
that had serious flaws, and did so in order to cut costs.